


fire escape

by triumph



Category: Hawkeye (Comics), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Brooklyn Nine-Nine (TV) Fusion, Alternate Universe - Police, Gen, M/M, Slice of Life, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-02-16
Updated: 2018-05-28
Packaged: 2019-03-19 10:13:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 15,938
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13702380
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/triumph/pseuds/triumph
Summary: FIRE ESCAPE: (n) an emergency exit, usually mounted to the outside of a building, in the event of an emergency that makes the main routes inside a building inaccessible. The escape route, built unconventional, for survival.Or: A story in three parts. A fantasy of a fantasy. Some suspension of disbelief required. Definitely not a strict Brooklyn 99 AU, but sometimes one in spirit, I hope.





	1. Monday

**Author's Note:**

> Blanket warnings:
> 
> A brief depiction of animal abuse. Mentions of/allusions to child abuse. Mentions/discussion of drug trafficking and addiction. Depictions of violence.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Wilson brought pie. If you hurry there might even be some left._

**PART ONE: JUNE**

 

CHAPTER 1: MONDAY

 

_7:32 AM_

Clint wakes up on the floor. He recognizes the rug burn against his cheek, by now. Sometime during the night he must have rolled out of bed again and stayed there. He rubs at his face. Remembers a flash of his dream, wrestling with someone in the grass, wind in his hair.

When he unpeels himself from the carpet and fumbles to switch off his phone alarm, he sees the text message that’d come in a few minutes ago. _Wilson brought pie,_ it says. _If you hurry there might even be some left._

Early summer, but the morning is generous: there’s a light breeze coming in through the window. He shuffles over and peers out. Everything outside is softened in gold. Somewhere a car honks, followed by a squeal of tires.

He yawns, scratches at the stubble on his chin. The world falls back into quiet.

 

_8:58 AM_

“So, stress-baking,” Barnes says.

Even from across the room Clint can see the slow clench of Wilson’s fist on his desk. “It’s just one pie,” he says without looking up from his paperwork. “Which you ate half of, might I add.”

“You leave him alone, Bucky,” Rogers says. Then he turns a concerned eye on Wilson. “But it _wasn’t_ stress-baking, right?”

Wilson puts his head in his hands. “Can’t a guy bring some pie to the office around here without getting the third degree,” he says.

“Are you calling me the bad cop?” Barnes says. He’s leaning back in his swivel chair, feet propped up on his desk. It’s a good thing Fury’s office door is closed.

“Gentlemen,” Stark says. He’s wearing sunglasses and nursing his head in a clear hangover. “As much as I highly esteem the Monday morning entertainment around here, if all this terrible flirting and talking and general loud noise-making goes on any longer I won’t be held responsible for the grievous bodily harm that may be inflicted upon persons in the immediate vicinity. Or myself. Yeah, probably just myself. Also, Wilson, if you’re ever up for taking requests, I have a thing for strawberry rhubarb. Just so you know.”

“You should try his lemon meringue,” Barnes offers.

Wilson narrows his eyes. “Definitely the bad cop,” he says, and Barnes points at himself, eyes wide, and mouths _who, me?_

“Stop relying on Sam’s free handouts,” Rogers says. “Which he makes out of the generosity of his heart and not from stress-baking. Because he’s got nothing to be stressed about.” He squints at him. “Right?”

“You leave him alone, Steve,” Barnes says, perfectly straight-faced.

Wilson throws up his hands. “I’m going to go _photocopy some files,_ ” he says, getting up from his chair.

“Ah,” Odinson says, perking up from his desk, “excellent. Would you please copy these for me, as well? Thank you.”

“Thor,” Stark says, as Wilson grabs the sheaf of papers from Odinson’s hand and stalks off. “Please tell me you’re not still scared of the photocopy machine.”

Odinson scowls at him. “The damned thing has eaten three of my reports, now,” he says darkly. “It is not to be trusted.”

Romanoff sidles up next to Clint from where he’s leant against the wall eating his pie. His pie, because when he’d walked in Banner had said “Oh, there you are” all distractedlike and shoved the paper plate at his chest. Clint had taken it, startled, and then watched him look around like he was searching for something for a good minute.

“Has anyone seen my glasses,” he had eventually said.

“They’re on your forehead,” Clint said, and Stark heaved a sigh.

“Thanks, Barton,” he said, “he could have kept at it for at least another two minutes. Lewis! Hey, Lewis. Did you get a good video?”

Lewis stared flatly at him from her desk. “Sorry,” she said, “I’m out of battery.” She was clearly playing what sounded like Angry Birds on her phone.

“What does Fury even pay you for,” Stark had said, and by then Clint had taken a bite of his pie. It was good. Everything Wilson brought in was always good. The man had a gift.

“They won’t last past June,” Romanoff says now, nodding her head at Rogers and Barnes, who have for all intents and purposes returned to their work, except for the fact that they’re both obviously sulking. “I put my money on Rogers being the first to crack. Who’d you bet on?”

“I didn’t,” Clint says through a mouthful of pie. Chews and swallows, and then: “You know, I don’t recall ever giving you my number.”

Romanoff raises an eyebrow. “Don’t you?”

Clint thinks about it. “No,” he decides, firmly.

Romanoff watches him. “Huh,” she says. Then shrugs. “Well, now you have mine.”

Clint eyes her warily, but before he can think of a reply Captain Fury bangs open his office door and breezes out into the station, Lieutenant Hill and Sergeant Coulson at his shoulders.

“Detectives and officers,” Fury barks. “In the briefing room, now. Barnes, get your feet off your desk. Rogers, you’ve got crumbs all over your shirt. Stark, you look like shit. Wherever the hell Wilson is, someone tell him to get his ass back here. Let’s get this day started, shall we?”

“Good morning to you too, Captain,” Stark says, and steals a swig of Banner’s coffee from his desk.

In his scramble to set down his paper plate and straighten out his patrol uniform all at once, Clint drops his fork on his shoe. One eye or not, Fury’s definitely seen, but he sweeps past him without a word on his way to the briefing room. Small mercies. Romanoff looks like she’s trying very hard not to smile.

“Shut it,” he tells her, even though she probably knows three different ways to kill him with the plastic fork at his feet. She just pats his shoulder and makes for the briefing room.

It’s going to be a hell of a long day.

 

_9:45 AM_

“Ma’am,” Clint says. “Are you aware of how fast you were going?”

“What the fuck are you talking about! I was barely speeding! Come on, don’t you have bank robbers to catch?”

“You were pushing fifty-five,” Clint says. “Also, this is a school zone.”

She squints at him. “It’s summer,” she says.

“It’s June,” Clint tells her. “School’s still in session. If you couldn’t tell by all the kids crossing the street right now.”

She looks him up and down, clearly making an assessment, and then juts out her lower lip, wobbling. There are actual tears in her eyes. “I’m sorry! Can’t you let me off just this once?”

“Ma’am, I’m going to need to see your license and registration.”

The waterworks disappear. “What about _your_ license and registration? Are you even a real cop? You look too scrawny to be a real cop. I bet my grandson could take you in a fight. Did you know he’s in the military? Serving our country? While you’re here attacking a poor old lady in the street?”

Clint casts his eyes up to the heavens. “Ma’am.”

 

_11:36 AM_

They’re parked on the side of the road. Clint eats his cheeseburger in the driver’s seat and watches Rumlow talk on his phone, standing outside with his back turned to the squad car. Some kid jaywalks across the street right in front of them, giving the finger the whole time. Rumlow doesn’t even notice. Lucky for the kid.

_Watch out for Thor today,_ Clint’s phone reads. _Someone stole his lunch sub again. He’s on the warpath._

_im sure u know who stole it,_ Clint texts back one-handed. _y dont u put an end to it._

_What, and ruin all the fun?_

Clint takes another bite of his cheeseburger. Rolls down the passenger side window to get some air.

“...already told you, tomorrow night,” Rumlow’s saying into his phone. “Nine o’clock at the usual place." His teeth are bared. "Don't disappoint me." 

He hangs up the phone and gets back in the car, slamming the door. Scowls.

“Did you eat my fries?” Rumlow says.

Clint wipes his mouth on a paper napkin. “You ready to get this show back on the road, partner?”

Rumlow grimaces. Clint shrugs, and turns the keys in the ignition.

 

_1:09 PM_

“We're here on reports of loud screaming and what sounded like a violent altercation," Rumlow says. "Your neighbours called. Is everything all right?"

The man peering through the crack of the door looks suitably contrite. "Everything's fine," he says. "I, ah. I'm sorry, this is so embarrassing—I was watching the game just now, and I got a little excited and knocked over a vase. I may have overreacted a little."

Rumlow doesn't hold back his snigger very well. "Just keep it down," he says, and makes to leave. 

Clint gets a hand in the door before the man can close it. Widens it just a bit.

"Yes, Officer?" the man says. "Is there anything else I can do for you?"

"What game is it?" Clint says. 

"What?"

"What's the game you were watching? I can't think of any game that might be going on right now." 

"Ah," the man says, eloquently. His eyes dart about for an answer, wild. His knuckles are scraped raw.

"Sir," Clint's saying, "do you live alone," but he can already see the figure standing behind him, shadowed in the hallway. A boy, trembling, neck ringed with bruises in the shape of fingers. 

Later, back at the station, Rumlow rolls his shoulders, cracks his spine. "Fucking paperwork," he grouses. "Y'know, Barton, I really hate it when your intuition turns out to be right." 

Clint watches the boy through the glass window of the office, slumped in his chair, eyes downcast. Waiting for whatever comes next. 

"So do I," he says.

The brief flutter of the clench of his fist at his side. 

 

_4:24 PM_

She spots him the same time he spots her. “Oh, shit,” he can hear her mutter to the girl next to her.

“Problem?” the other girl says, stiffening. Taking a step forward. They can’t be out of high school.

“No,” Kate Bishop sighs, and Clint’s honestly a little offended by that as he approaches. They’re loitering by a convenience store, backs against the wall. An explosion of graffiti, red and white behind them. “Hey, Officer. Since when is existing a crime?”

“Nice shiner,” Clint says, casual. “Where’d you get it from?”

Kate scowls at him with her nasty bruise of a black eye. “You’re not my dad.”

“No,” Clint agrees. “That’d be the guy who’s filed a missing persons report. Again. You know that, right?”

“It took him long enough to notice,” Kate snorts.

The other girl shoves forward, glaring at him from under the hood of a star-spangled sweatshirt. “Back off, cop,” she says.

Clint sighs. “Shouldn’t you be in class?”

She bares her teeth at him. Kate puts a hand on her shoulder in what Clint assumes is a placating gesture but only seems to fire her up even more, if the crack of her knuckles is any indication.

“I got this,” Kate says, and turns back to Clint. “Look, you’ve got to be getting tired of this run-and-chase game by now. I know I am. Just pretend you never saw me, and you can get back to your real job. You know, racial profiling and eating donuts and all.”

Rumlow’s watching from the squad car. Clint can feel his eyes on his back. “Just come on back to the station, kid,” he says. “Don’t do this the hard way. Trust me—I know. It never works.”

Kate’s eyes narrow, something shuttering closed. “Right,” she says. “Sound advice, thanks. I’ll remember that.”

In the vicinity there’s a yelp and a screech of brakes. Someone leaning on their horn. Clint instinctively turns to assess the damage, and when he turns back around they’re gone. The clatter of running footsteps in the air.

“Fuck,” Clint says.

But he doesn’t chase very hard.

Back in the car Rumlow snorts. “Can’t even catch a teenage girl,” he says. “You must be slipping, Barton.”

“Must be,” Clint agrees.

 

_6:45 PM_

“Ha,” Wilson says, changing _38_ to _39_ on the whiteboard. “I’m still winning.”

“Only by two arrests,” Barnes says. “Hey, Steve. What’s the view like from the back?”

Rogers stares gloomily down at the file on his desk. “It’s just this one case,” he says, scrubbing a hand over his face. “Drug-related, again. Three bodies pumped full of Blue Ice, and it's like no one can _stop_ any of this, no one can figure it out.”

The station falls into its usual glum and awkward silence at the mention of Blue Ice. Glum, because it's a real problem, and awkward, because the root of that problem is glowering at them from the family photo framed on Odinson's desk. It's only broken by a cough from Stark that sounds suspiciously like "slump!" 

Wilson points finger guns at Rogers. “Eat my dust.”

“We’ve still got till the end of the year,” Rogers protests.

“Yeah, and then you’re gonna pay up. You’d better sleep with one eye open, both of you.”

Nobody is really sure what stakes they’re betting on. That in itself is a bet—Rogers’ motorbike, Wilson’s car, Barnes having to dye his hair pink. The station, Clint believes, runs purely on betting power and Fury’s sheer force of will. And also maybe some sticking glue Stark’s put together.

Rogers nods at Clint in greeting as he’s making for the exit. “Good day, Officer?”

Clint wonders if his hair is as frazzled as it feels. “Fine,” he says.

“That was a trick question,” Barnes calls from his desk. “When is it _ever_ a good day here?”

“The day I beat both your asses and win,” Wilson says. He sounds wistful, like it’s already happened and he’s remembering it. “That’s gonna be a good day.”

“The day I won against Thor in fire extinguisher roller chair derby was a good one,” Stark pipes up.

“You cheated,” Odinson says. “I remember very clearly.”

“When Steve exploded the microwave and set his eyebrows on fire,” Stark barrels on. “When that perp got out of holding and tried to take Natasha hostage. When I stole Bruce’s coffee and replaced it with decaf. Oh wait, that was this morning.”

“I knew there was something off,” Banner sighs, taking off his glasses and rubbing at his eyes. Clint notes where he sets his glasses down. Just in case.

“When Fury accidentally locked himself out of his office,” Lewis offers. “I livetweeted the whole thing. It was amazing, until Coulson hacked into my account and deactivated it.”

“There was never any proof that was me,” Coulson says, emerging from the office in question with such suspicious timing that Clint’s convinced he’s got the station bugged. “Officer Barton, the captain wants to see you in his office.”

The station goes still. Every eye turns to Clint, which in his memory has never happened except for that one time two weeks ago when he’d sunk into a chair pressing ice against his forehead and only when his ears had stopped ringing did he realize everyone around him was clapping. Then Fury had called him into his office to yell at him about recklessness in the line of duty and putting himself and others at risk. His usual rap sheet. But Barton’s laid low ever since—or at least, he thought he had. He’s only had two weeks to fuck up, after all, and that’s got to be a record, even for him. Except that’s when he remembers Kate Bishop, a running blur disappearing in the distance, and her rich philanthropist billionaire of a dad. Oh.

“Five bucks say he’s getting either promoted or fired,” Stark announces to the room at large.

“Shut up, Tony,” Rogers says. “It’s probably just a mission briefing.”

Stark points his finger at him. “Five bucks! No take-backs!”

Clint passes by Romanoff on his way to the office. Her face reveals nothing, except for the fact that—she knows, he realizes with sudden certainty. She knows what this is about. He stares at her, but she doesn’t blink. Just holds his gaze and returns it.

Well, Clint thinks. This is how it ends. It’s lasted him longer than anyone would ever have expected, most of all himself, but there’s a part of him that suddenly doesn’t want to go down without a fight. Stubbornly insists he could have gone on a while longer. He could’ve done a good job. A good job as any.

He enters the office and closes the door behind him.

“Officer Barton,” Fury says.

“Captain,” Clint says, hands clasped behind his back, standing ramrod straight.

“How many years have you been here, Officer?”

Clint squints at him. He knows this is a test, somehow. He just can’t see how it can be passed.

“Two years, Captain.”

Fury grunts noncommittally. “What do you think of your work here?”

“Fine, sir,” Clint says. And hastily amends, “Though of course it could be better. Will be. Better.”

Fury raises an eyebrow. “Good,” he says. And then he places a packet of paper on the desk between them, before him. Pushes it forward to Clint so he can read it.

It reads, _Recommendation for National Detective/Investigator Test._ And below that, his name and rank.

There’s a lot of other text after that, but that’s where Clint stops reading.

“What?” Clint says.

“I would think,” Fury says, "that the text is perfectly clear." 

“No, sorry, sir—I just—” Clint swallows. Tries to land on just one thing to say. He finds it summed up best with the word: “Why?”

Fury’s eyebrows shoot up. “Are you questioning me, Officer?”

“No, sir,” Clint begins, until he realizes that’s exactly what he’s doing, so he shuts up instead. Switches track. “Why now?”

“In the two years you've been an officer here, your work has been consistently efficient. Surely you don't believe it's gone unnoticed."

“Sir,” Clint says. “I do all my work in the field. I just follow orders, do what I'm told. I’m not a detective.” 

“But you could be,” Fury says. His eye unblinking. “Tell you what, Officer. Why don’t you take a week to think about it. Take the packet, read through it. Then you come to me with your decision, and we’ll leave it at that. In the meantime do your job, and think long and hard about why you’re doing it in the first place.” He pauses. “Because I think it would be a damn shame if you forgot.”

If there's one thing he's learned working under Fury, it's that he knows a dismissal when it's given to him. “Yes, sir,” Clint says. He takes the packet.

When he comes out of the office Stark honks a _party blower,_ where the hell did he get that from. Banner wheels over on his chair and snatches it straight out of his mouth without even needing to look up from the file in his hand.

“Five bucks, Steve,” Stark crows. “Looks like you’re joining the party at last, Barton.”

Clint stares at them, one hand still on the knob of Fury’s closed door.

Stark’s smile freezes on his face. “Right?”

“I,” Clint says. “I said I’d think about it.”

They’re all staring at him now. Again.

“Aw, Barton,” Barnes says, sitting properly in his chair for once. “It’s not a bad a job as we make it seem, really. The worst part is having to put up with Stark’s chatter all day.”

“Hey,” Stark says, but it's halfhearted at best. Even he recognizes a point past defense. 

“The benefits package is pretty sweet,” Wilson offers.

“You’ll be able to do better work,” Rogers says. 

“It is your decision, Officer,” Odinson says, awfully magnanimous. “But we would be honoured to welcome you to the ranks.” He glares at no one in particular, as though daring them to argue.

Romanoff says nothing at all. Just watches Clint, as though waiting for something.

“Right,” Clint says, suddenly tired. “I’m clocking out for the day, detectives. See you tomorrow.”

He raises two fingers in a half-wave, half-salute, and breezes out of the station with his jacket over his arm. On the subway train home, he sits between a sleeping college student whose head is threatening to loll onto his shoulder and an old man with a lion head engraved into his walking stick and stares out the white noise of the windows. Allows himself to wonder, for the first time in a while, just how on earth he’d ended up here.

 

_7:48 PM_

He’s coming up the steps to his apartment building when he hears it. Laughter and voices coming from the alleyway, and underneath it all, a low whine. It’s a noise he’d recognize anywhere: the sound of being hurt.

“Aw, hell,” Clint says. Pockets his keys and doubles around back. By the dumpster there’s a couple of men in tracksuits smoking cigars. At their feet lies a crumpled shape. One still moving, even as one of the men rears back his leg, Adidas shoe poised for the kick.

“Hey!” Clint shouts, loud enough to startle the pigeons from their perch on the telephone wires above. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

The men blink at him and start reaching for their pockets. Fuck that. Once Clint would’ve been halfway across the alleyway by now, fists up and flying. But that’s a Clint of another time. In this one all he has to do is flash his badge and stalk forward.

“NYPD,” he says, and the men turn and run out the other end of the alleyway, disappearing into the evening. The shape stays on the ground, still whining. Clint puts away his badge and kneels next to it, cautious.

“Hey, buddy,” he says, and the dog stills. Fuck, they got him in the _eye,_ he should’ve chased and hauled their asses to the station. “I’m going to help you, okay?”

The dog is silent. Then, eye busted-up and fur matted with blood and tail dragging limply on the ground, he snuffles slightly, and leans up to lick at Clint’s outstretched hand.

“Fuck,” Clint says.

How is this his life.

 

_8:32 PM_

“He’s not my dog,” Clint says.

“Right,” the vet says, looking none too impressed. “Well, he’s got abdominal bruising and he’s lost the eye. But he’ll recover quickly, with the proper rest and care.”

“Huh,” Clint says, looking down at the dog on the table. The dog looks back at him. Wags his tail.

“What’s his name?” the vet says.

“I told you,” Clint says. “He’s not my dog.”

“Of course,” the vet says, and then, “you can talk to the secretary for the bill at the front desk.”

_The benefits package is pretty sweet,_ Wilson’s voice pops unbidden into his head. Clint snorts. “Sure,” he says, and the vet nods, leaves the room.

The dog is still wagging his tail, slowly but surely. His tongue’s lolling out. He looks as tired as Clint feels.

Clint leans in close, carefully ruffles his hand under his ears.

“Good boy,” Clint says, and the dog barks in response.

 

_9:16 PM_

This being his life, he runs into Rogers and Wilson at the grocery store. If it’s any consolation, they look just as startled to see him.

“Detectives,” Clint says. Tilt of his head. 

“Outside of the station, it’s just Steve,” Rogers says. His smile is bashful. He’s got a basket with milk and a carton of eggs. Wilson’s holding a package of sugar. It all seems frighteningly domestic, at odds with their slacks and ties, though Rogers’ suit jacket is slung over his arm. They must have come straight from the station. Another late night.

“We share an apartment,” Rogers offers by way of explanation, like Clint doesn’t already know.

“What about Barnes?” Clint says before he can stop himself.

Rogers looks surprised. Wilson just laughs. “That’s what I’ve been saying,” he says. “The guy’s gotta start paying rent for our couch.”

Clint nods in reply. Finds he doesn’t have anything else to say. Normally at the station they’d all go back to their work. But this isn’t work.

“I didn’t know you had a dog,” says Rogers.

Right. The bag of dog food in Clint’s hand. “I didn’t,” he says. He scratches at the back of his head. “It’s kind of a new development.”

“Oh,” Rogers says, nodding like he understands perfectly. “What’s his name?”

Clint shrugs. “A very new development,” he says.

“We should get a dog, Steve,” Wilson says. Straight white teeth flashing in a smile. “One to stand guard against Barnes the next time he sneaks in through the window and give him a heart attack.”

“No dog,” Rogers says. “Can you imagine? A dog with you lot in the apartment—no way. Someone would die in the chaos.”

“That’s the goal,” Wilson says.

Clint shifts from foot to foot as though searching for an escape. He’s not sure how he slots into this. They must pick up on it—police detectives, right—because Wilson nods slightly. “Have a good night,” he says. “See you tomorrow.”

“Oh, and Clint,” Rogers says, a bit too earnestly to be believed. “I know you’re still sitting on the Captain’s offer. But I just want you to know—we’d all be glad to welcome you to the investigative team.”

Ever generous, Clint thinks. To a fault. But he means it—he thinks—when he thanks him in response.  

On his way home he gets a pizza for himself, because dinner, right. He’d forgotten that was a thing, but his stomach is remembering, now.

He pours out the dog food in his last clean bowl and lays it out on the floor. The dog sniffs at it. Then steals a slice of pizza from the box.

“Of course,” Clint says.

The dog nudges at his hand and licks the tomato sauce from his fingers.

The television is a low hum of noise. Oh, look. Dog Cops is on.

“Look,” Clint says, “it’s us.”

The dog yawns and settles on the floor. Clint leans back on the couch. Out the open window, the summer night’s a thick haze of heat, sticking his shirt to his skin and lulling his eyes half-closed.

He dreams of wild green grass and wind.

 


	2. Tuesday

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Odinson showed up to work with a hell of a shiner. You have to see it to believe it._

_7:35 AM_

Something wet is tickling his palm. Clint blinks open his eyes. His phone alarm is beeping and the dog is trying to eat his hand from where it’s dangling off the couch.

“Damn,” Clint says. “I have an actual bed and everything. That was stupid.”

The crick in his neck agrees.

It’s only when he comes back out of the shower that he sees the package of paper sitting on his table. Right. He sips his coffee and eyes it like it’s gonna jump up and bite him. You never know.

He splits the last of the leftover pizza between him and the dog, and watches as a message comes in on his phone.

 _Odinson showed up to work with a hell of a shiner,_ it says. _You have to see it to believe it._

“No way anyone got the drop on Odinson,” Clint says aloud.

The dog barks, just once, as though in agreement.

 

_8:53 AM_

“No way anyone got the drop on you,” Stark says. “Did you walk into a door? No, scratch that, the door would break.”

Odinson looks entirely unruffled, sitting at his desk and typing into his computer with a bruised jaw and a row of butterfly bandages lined up on his forehead, peeking out from under his mane of gold hair. “You should see the other guy,” he says, perfectly straight-faced.

“Hold on,” Stark says, with more awe in his tone than he might have liked to let on. “Did you _kill_ someone? That your side job? Deadly assassin?”

Odinson sighs. “It was a joke,” he says. “No one is dead. Just a personal issue that is resolved.”

Lewis doesn’t look impressed. “Resolved, right,” she says, “does Jane know about this,” and Odinson’s easy smile disappears.

“You’re right, you don’t fit that profile anyway,” Stark’s saying, “you’ve got too much of a friendly giant, golden retriever vibe, that seems like it’d be more Romanoff’s thing.” Romanoff smiles at him in reply. It’s not a nice smile. Stark conspicuously wheels his chair a few inches away.

“If you need to file a report,” Rogers says, all concernedlike, but Odinson is shaking his head.

“Friends,” he says, firm. “It is resolved.”

Hmm, Clint thinks, taking a swig of his coffee, and amends his earlier judgment. Maybe someone could. Just the one person.

“Was it the mob,” Stark’s _still_ going on. “The mafia. Oh shit, did someone put a hit on you? Are you on the run _from_ deadly assassins?”

“Tony,” Banner says. Eyes bloodshot from exhaustion. His shirt is rumpled. Clint has a sneaking suspicion about whether or not he left the station at all last night. “Leave it.”

“Make me,” Stark says, but then he must notice the tightness of Odinson’s mouth, _finally,_ because he says, “oh, never mind. Did anyone else see the double homicide from last night? Quite lovely, wasn’t it?”

After a few minutes, Barnes says, offhand, “Thought you’d maybe gotten bullied by the photocopier again,” and the tension breaks. Wilson chuckles into his palm. Odinson leans back in his chair and sighs.

“I trust not Stark’s machines,” he says.

Which is funny, really, because there’s hardly an object left in the station that _hasn’t_ been turned into one of Stark’s machines. The coffee maker that also functions as a can opener, a calculator, and a staple remover. Banner’s ergonomic chair that comes with its own heating, recliner, and massage functions that he refuses to ever use. The photocopier that Stark’s programmed to greet everyone by name and rank through its automated display—everyone, somehow, except Odinson. All these upgrades would really boost station productivity by a good amount if he didn’t also use them to pull heinous pranks on people. It’s been a total of six days since Rogers’ computer was last hacked, and the man is starting to get real jumpy out of conditioned paranoia.

“Y’know what, Thor,” Stark says, pointing a pen at him from across the station and grinning like a shark, “that’s probably smart of you.”

On their way into the briefing office, Wilson nudges Clint’s shoulder. “Hey," he says. "You come up with a name for your dog yet?”

“I didn’t know you had a dog,” Romanoff says. Clint could’ve sworn she was on the other side of the room. She raises an eyebrow at him from over her coffee mug.

“Not my dog,” Clint says. He shrugs. “But not anybody else’s, either. He had a collar, though. It said ‘Arrow.’”

“Huh,” Romanoff says. “Strange name.”

“Kinda badass,” Barnes says. When did he become part of this conversation, anyhow. He cocks his head. “But not the right one?”

Clint considers it. “An arrow’s an object,” he says. “Doesn’t really do anything after it’s been shot.”

“Except stay where it is like a pain in the ass,” Wilson says.

“That part’s over,” Clint says. “Thinking of something new, now.”

“How about Bullet,” Barnes says. “Much more twenty-first century.”

“Ha, ha,” Clint says.

“Dexter?” Wilson says. “Buddy? Falcon? Buster?”

“Spot,” Romanoff suggests. Clint levels a stare at her. She sips her coffee innocently.

“Clint Junior,” Wilson’s saying, and of course that’s the first thing Fury hears when he steps into the room. His eyebrows go all the way up.

“Why, Officer Barton,” Fury says. “I didn’t know you were expecting. Congratulations.”

All eyes are, once again, on Clint. He drains the rest of his coffee cup just so he doesn’t have to look at them. Barnes can’t quite stop sniggering through the rest of the meeting, and if Clint accidentally steps on his foot on the way out, nobody else has to know.

 

_10:20 AM_

“He just came out of nowhere!” the guy shouts. A pimply-faced twentysomething bleeding from his forehead. Face red with outrage. “Do you even _know_ what a turn signal is, asshole? I'm gonna sue!”

“This is a brand new car,” the other guy says. Pissed-off looking businessman, suit and briefcase and all. “If anyone's going to be pressing charges, it's me.”

“Look,” Clint says. “Just tell me what happened, as you remember it.”

One of the cars' hubcaps falls off and clatters to the ground. 

“I'm gonna  _sue,_ ” Pimples says. 

The other guy's already calling his lawyer. 

“Is he allowed to do that?” Pimples demands. 

Clint surveys the smoking wreckage. Feels a strange sort of kinship.

“Start from the beginning,” he says. 

 

_12:53 PM_

He’s at a hot dog truck. His favourite. The owner, Mike, must recognize him by now, even if he never returns Clint’s greeting with anything more than a surly grunt. Pigeons are gathering all around, eyeing Clint, just waiting for him to drop his lunch.

A hooded man runs by, clutching a purse to his chest. Clint sticks out his foot, and he goes flying.

Rumlow comes skidding into sight, hair wild and breath heaving. “Gotcha,” he says, pinning a knee down into the perp’s back. “You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in the court of law...”

Mike looks at Clint. Clint finishes his hot dog. The pigeons coo in disappointment.

“Barton, a little help?” Rumlow snaps. He’s wrestling the perp’s arms behind his back, fumbling with the handcuffs. His fingernails are dirty. Torn in the scuffle, probably. Stained slightly with blue.

“Sure,” Clint says. There’s mustard dripping down his wrist. He licks it off.

 

_3:34 PM_

“So the perps came in here with guns,” Clint says, “threatened your life, and then stole—what was it—ah, yes. Three hundred dollars' worth of cheesecakes.”

“It was five hundred dollars' worth!” the baker shouts. “And that's not even counting the property damage!”

“Right, right.” Clint scratches behind his ear with his pen. “Can you go into more detail? What did the perps look like?”

“They looked like a bunch of good-for-nothing hoodlums, that's what! Aren't you going to go after them? I have orders waiting!” The baker clutches the edge of his counter, white-knuckled. “This is going to destroy my 4.8 star customer satisfaction rating, you know! I need those cakes back, now!”

Clint looks at Rumlow. Rumlow looks at Clint. Clint looks outside the bakery, at the sunlight glinting off the sidewalks, and imagines five hundred dollars' worth of cheesecake spoiling in the heavy summer heat. It isn't a pretty sight. 

“Condolences, sir,” Clint says. “But, uh, I'd suggest you get baking as soon as possible, then. Now—the thieves. Can you describe them for me.”

There's a bit of cake smeared onto the side of the counter, where the perps must have fumbled one of the cheesecakes in their hasty getaway. Clint runs a finger through the mess and sucks it into his mouth. 

“If it's any consolation, sir,” he says, through a mouthful of frosting. “Your cheesecake really is excellent.”

The baker drops his head into his hands. “I'm retiring,” he announces, to no one in particular.

Rumlow shoots him a look, like,  _are you fucking kidding me right now, get your act together, man, what are you doing._

I haven't the faintest idea, Clint thinks, and swallows all the sweetness down. 

 

_6:48 PM_

From the office kitchen comes a loud bang, and then a muffled curse. Everyone slowly looks at each other, and then at Stark's empty swivel chair. 

“That's ten days since the last explosion,” Lewis says from her desk. “I was closest—everyone else, pay up.”

There's some grumbling, but they all do. When Lewis gets to Clint with her baseball cap filled with crumpled dollar bills, though, he just shrugs at her. 

“Killjoy,” Lewis tells him. 

“I don't bet,” Clint says.

"Oh, come on,” Lewis says, with a roll of her eyes. “Everyone bets. Who's gonna win  _their_ bet—” she nods her head at Rogers, Barnes, and Wilson at their desks “—and which one of them's gonna make the first move, when Thor's going to break the next piece of office equipment, how long before Bruce notices that Tony switched the name plates on their desks, who keeps stealing Thor's lunches from the fridge, the gender, background, occupation, and relationship status of Coulson's cellist, what country Natasha's really from, what's your deal. We bet on everything. It's how we get by in this place.”

“I don't have a _deal_ ,” Clint says. 

“Everybody's got a deal,” Lewis says. She taps a turquoise-painted fingernail against her chin. “Plus, it all boosts morale and camaraderie, or something.”

Stark chooses that moment to burst out of the kitchen, shirt only slightly disheveled, hair still smoking. “I fixed the toaster!” he announces. 

Rogers stares at him in mild horror. “When was it ever  _broken?_ ”

In the commotion it should be easy to slip out of the station unnoticed, but a large shadow falls over him as he's putting on his jacket. Clint stares up at Odinson, and knows well enough to resign himself to his attention.

“Barton,” Odinson says, voice hushed. The bruising looks wrong on his face, so usually immaculate. Good as gold. Clint finds himself staring at the butterfly bandages as he talks. “We are holding a celebration this Friday after work at the bar, in honour of Steve's fifth year on the force. It will be a magnificent surprise.”

Clint blinks at him. “Wow,” he says, “five years, huh. That's, uh, that's great.” He casts a glance at Rogers, who's rubbing at his eyes as Stark goes on about something, waving his hands in the air. 

“We will all be there," Odinson says. “And Tony has most generously offered to pay for the drinks. Will you join us?”

Clint can feel eyes on his back. Of course they picked Odinson to ask him, he thinks. Standing tall before him, beaming bright like Clint's already said yes. Like there's no other possibility in the world. 

“Sure,” Clint says. “Why not?”

“Excellent!” Odinson claps a hand to Clint's back. Clint tries not to choke on air. “It will be a most joyous night! One to remember!”

“Right,” Clint says, rubbing at his back. “I'll see you tomorrow, Detective.”

“You as well,” Odinson says, inclining his head, and then, “Good night, Officer Barton.”

It's oddly sincere, like the rest of him. But between them, it almost feels out of place. “Right,” Clint says again, “uh, you too,” and he ducks his head awkwardly, makes his escape. 

 

_8:33 PM_

He takes the dog out for a walk in the evening. Why not—the weather’s nice, and the dog’s practically scratching at the walls. They make their way down the blocks, the dog sniffing at everything in their path. Clint turns left, right, left again. Stops by an alleyway and lets the dog pee on a lamppost. Just stands there and listens, for a while, to the snatches of conversation on the streets.

“Oh my god,” says Kate Bishop. “Are you stalking me?”

Clint sighs from under the brim of his beat-up baseball cap. “Go away,” he says.

“Aren’t you going to arrest me, Officer?”

“You’re a runaway, not a delinquent,” Clint says. “Also, I’m off duty.”

“Huh,” Kate says. She’s not alone—no sign of the other girl from yesterday, but there’s a pair of boys with her, one looking at him nervously, the other eyeing the dog. They’re holding hands.

“Go ahead,” Clint says. “He doesn’t bite.” He squints down at the dog. “I think.”

The guy’s already scratching the dog under the ears. The dog looks how he does when he's eating pizza. Clint makes a disgusted noise.

“Traitor,” he tells him.

“Traitor,” Kate tells the guy. “He’s a cop!”

“Yeah, but the dog isn’t,” the guy says. “What’s his name?”

“I’m not sure yet,” Clint says.

“What, you haven’t even named your dog?”

“Gotta get it right, don’t I?” Clint says.

“What happened to his eye,” says the other guy, the one who hasn’t stopped watching Clint. Wary.

“People,” Clint says, though he probably already knows the answer. The guy’s mouth tightens, and he turns away, fist clenched.

“C’mon, Billy,” the first guy says. “He doesn’t bite, he’s a good boy. Wanna pet him?”

“Of course he likes _you,_ ” Billy says, but he’s reaching out, hesitant. He pats the top of the dog’s head cautiously. The dog snuffles, and Billy stills before resuming. There is a look of slow awe on his face that Clint understands perfectly. The dog, already rolling over on the asphalt to bare his belly, bruised just yesterday.

“Good boy,” the first guy repeats.

“Dumb dog,” Clint tells him. “Stupid.” The dog preens.

“Like dog, like owner,” Kate says. She looks miffed. Her black eye’s faded to an angry yellow and her arms are crossed over her chest.

Clint shrugs. She’s not wrong.

“Why does she hate you so much, anyway,” the first guy says. Peering up at Clint from under his shaggy blond hair.

“He’s a cop!” Kate says, throwing up her arms.

“She’s a teenage delinquent runaway,” Billy says, like it explains everything.

“I saved her life one time,” Clint says.

“So she owes you a debt?” Billy says, curious.

Kate narrows her eyes at Clint. “I never asked you to,” she says.  

Clint smiles thinly. “Just doing my job,” he says.

“Like I said,” Kate says, voice hard. “He’s a cop.”

“Uh,” Billy says. “Right. Teddy, what say you we get out of here before the blood starts flying. Or whatever.”

Teddy drags his hand away from the dog with visible reluctance. “Fine,” he says. “Can we get boba?”

“Not without me,” Kate says. She turns an eye back on Clint. “You’re really not going to turn me in?”

“See you around,” Clint says. “Or not. Hopefully not.”

Kate squints at him for another moment, then looks away. “Right, whatever,” she says, and follows the boys away. It’s just Clint and the dog left on the street. Everyone else has left by now, and when he strains his ears, he can only hear traffic and the dog’s slow rumbling breath. Sprawled on the sidewalk, eyes half-lidded on the verge of sleep, looking every bit as tired as Clint feels.

“C’mon, boy,” Clint says. “Let’s go home.”

 

_2:38 AM_

He wakes up once, startled from sleep. His heart pounding in his ears. The darkness of the room drawn like curtains around him, so still. If he just holds his breath and stays stiff and quiet he can hide in that stillness forever. Stay until he becomes a part of it.

Beside him on the bed a weight shifts against his side. Warm fur tickling against his bare arm. A tongue, rough on his face.

“Hey,” Clint says, voice strained something awful. “Down, boy. Who said you could sleep on the bed?”

The dog whines. Wet nose poking at Clint’s ear.

“Okay, okay,” Clint says. “Geez. Better not snore, you big lug.”

He breathes in and out until the dog falls asleep, and until he does, too.

 


	3. Wednesday

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The text reads _Stark’s particularly distracted today._

_7:40 AM_

The text reads _Stark’s particularly distracted today._

Clint stares at it for longer than he’d like to admit. The message is cryptic enough for him to almost reply. His thumb hovers over the question mark on the keyboard of his phone.

The dog whines, nudging at his hand.

“Okay, okay,” he says. Resumes pouring dog food into the bowl, which he’d been doing when the text had come in. “I gotcha.”

And anyway, Clint muses to himself. It doesn’t really matter. Whatever it is, it can’t be _too_ bad.

 

_8:12 AM_

On his way to the station he spots Banner on the train. Just a quick sweeping glance when he’d straightened up, and his eye had caught a head of dark hair that shouldn’t have been familiar. He thinks maybe that’s what does it. If it had been anyone else—but it was just Banner, glasses and tie, staring blankly into the distance. The wrong piece in the picture.

Clint quietly makes his way over. Hands in his pockets.

“Hey,” he says, over the clatter of the rails.

Banner peers up at him. “Oh,” he says, “Barton,” and he nods at him, like he isn’t surprised at all to see him. Clint nods back.

Banner is standing, sort of hunched over, leant against one of the glass partitions. Clint leans against the one across from it. Between them, the doors opening and closing.

After a while, Clint tilts his head back against the glass. Closes his eyes.

 

_8:36 AM_

When they get to the station Stark’s spinning circles in Banner’s swivel chair. Clint suddenly remembers the text message on his phone like a physical weight in his pocket. Oh. Oh no.

“There he is,” Stark says, pointing at Banner, “the man of the hour. We’ve been taking bets,” he explains to Clint. “Why Bruce’s late.” His eyes are manic. There are three empty coffee cups on his desk, toppled over like dominoes.

“Traffic jam,” says Rogers, looking up from his papers. He sounds indifferent, but there’s a gleam of interest in his eye, like he just can’t help himself.

“Slept through his alarm,” says Wilson.

“Kidnapped by aliens,” says Barnes.

“Such a lack of imagination,” Stark sighs. “What’s your bet, Barton?”

Clint shrugs. “Long Starbucks line,” he suggests.

Banner is looking at him.

“Boring, boring, boring,” Stark says, wagging his pen in disapproval. “Clearly he was on the run for premeditated murder. Three counts. Guilty, of course.”

“What do you know, Tony,” Banner says. “You’re right. Congratulations. You win.”

He smiles, mouth closed. “Excuse me,” he says, and goes to the restroom.

Dead silence.

“Shit,” says Stark, perhaps the most eloquent he’s ever been.

Rogers looks uncertain. “Should we—”

“No,” says Barnes, not looking up from his computer screen. “Leave him be.”

Clint makes his way to the kitchen and starts pouring himself a cup of freshly brewed coffee. Lewis is eyeing him from over the top of her mug, which appears to be decorated with narwhals.

“So you do bet,” Lewis says, not without an air of triumph.

Clint sighs.

 

_10:08 AM_

He’s chasing a perp through the alleyways when the toe of his sneaker hooks onto a pothole and sends him sprawling. For a moment he’s stunned into just lying there, forehead against the asphalt, the sound of footsteps fading into the distance.

“Y’okay, Officer?”

Clint peels his face up from the floor to see a woman leaning out the window of the neighbouring building, peering down at him, flattened among the trashcans.

“Never better, ma’am,” he says.

She eyes him with an incredulity he can’t help but return with a splitting grin. Move along now, nothing to see here.

She closes the window. He runs his tongue over his lips. Tastes grit between his teeth. 

"The fuck, Barton," Rumlow says later in the squad car, incensed. "You had one job."

"Hmm," Clint says, studying the nasty gash on his forehead in the rearview mirror, and then, "You going to Rogers' celebration on Friday?"

Rumlow squints at him. "What? I haven't heard about it."

Clint shrugs. Digs up an old napkin from the passenger side compartment and blots at his forehead. "The whole station's invited, from the sound of it," he says.

Rumlow snorts. "Great," he says, "just what I wanna do with my Friday night. Spend more time with these guys."

"There's free drinks," Clint says.

"Aw, fuck," Rumlow says. But something glints in his eye, like a thought that's just struck him. "Friday, huh? Guess you'll see me there."

"Guess I will," Clint says.

A pause. 

"Get that blood cleaned up before it ends up all over the car, will you," Rumlow says. "Christ, you're a sorry sight." He huffs out a breath, shakes his head. "One job, Barton."

"Sure, sure," Barton says. Outside, a pair of crows are fighting over a scrap on the ground, wings aflutter in the summer air. 

 

_1:40 PM_

"You found him!" The woman's eyeliner is streaked all over her face, cheeks wet. "Jimmy, you're safe, you're home—" She cuts herself off by lunging forward through the doorway and throwing her arms around the sullen-faced teenager skulking on her front porch. 

"Turns out he didn't actually run away," Clint says, eyes averted two inches to the left. Something about the tearful embrace is too uncomfortable to directly look at. Too much. "Just stayed overnight at a friend's house and forgot to call. Funny how that happens." 

"God, Mom, you're embarrassing me," the son says. "You didn't have to call the _police,_ are you crazy—"

"You weren't answering your phone!" the mother wails. "And the way you'd just bust out of the house yesterday, I'd never seen you so angry before, I thought—" She still hasn't let him go. "I'm sorry," she says. "I didn't mean it. You know that, right, Jimmy?"

"God, Mom," the son says again, but gentler this time. "Of course I know. Shh, shh." 

Clint watches the careful placement of his palm on her back. Like soothing a spooked animal. 

"Come on, Mom," the son mutters. "Let's go home."

They shut the door in Clint's face. He stands there for a moment. Tips an imaginary hat.

"Good day to you too," he tells it. 

 

_4:22 PM_

"Hey, punks," Clint says, and then his face falls when the pair of teenagers spray-painting graffiti onto his police car take one look at him and bolt. Aw, running, no. Not again. 

He's vigilant with the potholes this time. The chase is almost pleasant, sprinting through streets and hurdling over fences, shoes thudding against the pavement. Wind in his hair. He almost remembers grass tickling at his back, but when he's running he doesn't have time to think of anything, the clearness of his mind a sweet relief. He's almost sorry to corner the culprits in an alleyway, to be pulled out of the mindless race. 

"You really got nothing better to do?" one of the teenagers demands. 

Clint thinks of the package of papers lined up neatly on his table, where he'd set it down three days ago and hadn't touched it since. 

"No," he says. Then he amends: "Not yet."

They'd spray painted a dick onto the passenger side door. Rumlow gripes about it for the rest of the day, which thankfully isn't very long. 

 

_6:30 PM_

When he enters the station Barnes nods at him in the hallway. "Hey," he says with a sideways glance, and then a double take. "What happened to you?"

"What?"

"Your face," Barnes says. "What, some crook gave you a run for your money?"

"I fell," Clint says. It's the truth, but the irony isn't lost on him. He laughs a little. Barnes is staring at him. 

"Y'okay, Barton," Barnes says, sounding so much like the woman from that morning that Clint's surprised into another bout of laughter. Shit, now he really must think Clint's lost it. 

"I'm fine, Detective," he says, and he brushes past him. He stops short. All eyes are on Stark, who is sitting in his desk chair with his stare fixed straight on Banner, who is working at his desk, resolutely pretending he doesn't notice any of this. The pretense would work better if it weren't for the vein pulsing visibly in his temple. 

"Damn," Clint mumbles, under his breath. "What'd I miss."

The pencil in Banner's hand snaps in two. 

“A word, Banner,” Fury says, materializing out of nowhere, and Banner goes with the air of a hunted man, Stark’s narrowed eyes following him all the way to the slam of Fury’s office door.

The station lets out a collective breath. 

"You should leave him alone, Tony," Rogers says, voice low. "He's obviously going through a lot."

"Great suggestion," Stark says, falsely bright. "It's been noted. Aaaaand ignored. But thanks for your contribution."

Wilson snorts. "Man, if being an asshole is your full-time job, what are you even still doing here?"

"Someone's got to supply the good looks around here," Stark says. "And the charm. The dry wit. The intelligent conversation."

"Don't push it," Wilson says.

There's someone at Clint's shoulder. He's only just become aware of it. 

"You're bleeding," Romanoff says. 

"Tell me something I don't know."

She eyes him sharply, like she's considering doing exactly that. Then the shutters coming back down. 

"Go home, Barton," she says, turning away. 

He does. 

 

_8:56 PM_

The dog is pawing at Clint where he lies facedown on the couch, but he's too lazy to move. "Urhggh," he grunts. "Go away."

A whine. The dog, apparently fed up with Clint's bullshit, leaps up onto the couch, or more accurately, onto Clint's back. Noses at his neck before lying down.

"Oof," Clint says. His forehead throbs and his legs are cramping and a sweat patch is beginning to form under all the pounds of labrador retriever on his back. He still doesn't move. 

"Gotta stop feeding you so much pizza," Clint says, muffled into the cushions. 

It's early yet. The sun hasn't yet sunk, still stubbornly clinging to the sky for all its light is worth. 

He closes his eyes. Falls asleep to the sound of traffic through the open window, the slow turn of the ceiling fan, the shouting match of the couple living next door.

Signs of life. 

 


	4. Thursday

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He pulls out his phone and checks the screen. No new messages.

_7:30 AM_

Clint wakes up, stumbles into the shower, watches the water sluice down the drain. Scratchy towel, stiff shirt. Food for the dog and summer in the air and it isn’t until he’s on the train that he realizes what’s missing.

He pulls out his phone and checks the screen. No new messages.

Clint’s seated between a businessman and a woman yelling angrily into her phone. Banner isn’t on the train today; Clint’d looked for him, despite himself, but he isn’t surprised. Once is random enough for the realm of absurd possibility under which this city operates. Twice is a pattern. Means something.

The woman beside him swears rapid-fire in a language he doesn’t know. The businessman scratches under the collar of his suit jacket. Outside the windows, the subway tunnels flash by in a blur and a flicker.  

Clint pulls his bottom lip between his teeth. Considers the mostly one-sided conversation on the screen laid out on his lap. Five messages. A pattern, he remembers, means something.

Carefully, one-handed, Clint types:

_slow day?_

He’s almost at his stop by the time the response rolls in.

_Never._

But then, like an afterthought:

_Coulson wishes, though._

Clint’s reply is immediate.

_pics or it didnt happen_

At the turnstiles, the file loads on his phone. A blurry stealth shot of what is unmistakably Stark and Rogers yelling at each other in the middle of the station, Banner at his desk with a thousand-yard stare while Wilson leans back in his chair shoveling pretzels in his mouth like it’s popcorn. Odinson has headphones on. Barnes cracks his knuckles threateningly in the background. Through a crack in the windowblinds of Fury’s office, Coulson is caught glowering out at them all.

It’s much worse than Clint was imagining, but also: _seems about right,_ he texts. _call 911?_

 _Clint,_ the reply reads. _We are 911._

_r u sure_

_You know, I’m starting to question it myself._

He emerges from the station to wind in his hair. Sun on his face.

 

_8:40 AM_

By the time Clint arrives the aftermath has already begun to sink in. Banner’s conspicuously empty chair. Everyone eyeing each other nervously except for Rogers typing so furiously on his computer that his keyboard rattles while Stark pointedly plays Candy Crush at full volume on his phone, feet propped up on his desk. The blinds on Fury's office window pulled shut. Clint enters the station feeling like he’s trespassing on the quiet devastation of a bomb site.

Clint waves a hand. “Yo,” he says. “What’s up?”

Rogers glares at him, then frowns, uncertain, like he’s remembered who Clint is, or isn’t.

“The end of the world,” says Wilson, not looking up from his desk.

“Naw, it wasn’t that bad,” Barnes says, stealing one of Wilson’s pretzels and crunching down. “Happens every Thursday. Right on schedule.”

Lewis is making paper airplanes out of important-looking papers. She launches one, and it lands in Odinson’s mane of hair. He doesn’t notice.

“You look better,” says Barnes, out of nowhere. Clint eyes him. Barnes shrugs, gesturing with his hand to his forehead. He doesn’t say anything else.

“Thanks,” Clint says, but Barnes just nods at him, like he already knows.

Clint casts an eye around the station. Everyone’s getting back to work. Romanoff, though, is watching him from the kitchen doorway.

Clint waves at her. Two-fingered.

She tilts her head at him. Waves back.

 

_11:51 AM_

Two traffic tickets; one speeding, one highly illegal U-turn in the middle of a packed intersection. During a red light, no less. One car crash with minor injuries. One house burglary. All before noon. Clint leans back in his car seat, scrawls an end to a sentence in his report. Licks his finger and flips the page. Whistles along with the radio—a perky commercial jingle that won’t get out of his head.

“You’re in a good mood today, Barton,” Rumlow says, almost suspiciously. Like it’s a crime.

“Never,” Clint says, feigning astonishment.

The windows are rolled down, the heat something awful. They’re parked by the side of the road, Rumlow scowling over his coffee cup at everyone who walks past, as though daring them to do something.

“This coffee is fucking disgusting,” Rumlow says.

“It’s a disgrace,” Clint agrees.

Rumlow glowers at him with bloodshot eyes. He rubs at his forehead, fingernails cracked, veins running blue up his forearms.

“Rough night?” Clint says.

“Shut up,” Rumlow says.

To his credit, Clint almost does. He can’t quite help the whistling, though.

 

_3:44 PM_

He’s trying to suck up the last of his Slurpee when he hears it.

“Oh, no.”

“That’s my line,” Clint says, turning around, and then he stares back at the group of teens staring at him.

“Are you running a _gang,_ ” he says around his Slurpee straw. “Because that’s what it looks like to me.”

“Jesus, you know a cop?” The guy sounds disgusted. Clint’s almost offended.

“Great,” Kate says. “I’m gonna lose all my street cred.”

“Like you had any to begin with,” the guy mutters.

“What’re you doing here,” another girl says, shouldering her way to the front. Hey, he knows this one. Star-spangled.

Clint waves the empty Slurpee cup at her, then nods at the 7-11 sign. “What do you think?” They’re lucky Rumlow’s in the restroom.

Kate is watching him warily, like he’s a dog about to snap. It’s mildly insulting.

“How old are you, twelve?” the first guy says. What is it with this dude. He’s got an impressive shiner, though. Kate’s is only just beginning to fade. Now that Clint’s looking, he sees that star-spangled girl’s lip is cut up, and the other girl, peering at him curiously from over Kate’s shoulder, has a faint bruise on her temple under wisps of blond hair.

“What are you, a bunch of secret vigilantes,” Clint says. It’s meant to be a joke, but the guy’s eyes harden. Oh. Oh, no, indeed. “Wait. You’ve got to be kidding me. Have you all just watched too many movies, or what—”

“We’re _leaving,_ that’s what we are,” Kate says, and stomps on the guy’s foot.

“What the fuck was that for!”

“Shut up, Eli,” says star-spangled girl. “We’re done here.”

“Wait, I still don’t get who this guy is,” the blond girl says.

“Kate,” Clint says, and she stops. “This is the worst idea I’ve ever seen. And that’s saying something, trust me.”

A poor choice of words. Kate glares at him. “Trust you,” she says. “Like I’ll make that mistake again.”

“Kate,” Clint tries, but they’re already gone.

He looks down at his Slurpee. It isn’t finished, but he’s lost his appetite.

 

_6:42 PM_

“Long day?” Rogers asks when Clint emerges from the station locker room, and for once Clint actually considers the question. Actually considers that Rogers might want a response.

“There may or may not be a gang of teenage vigilantes running around the city thinking they’re superheroes,” Clint says.

Rogers stares at him for a little too long.

“Thank god it’s almost Friday?” Clint tries.

Barnes has collapsed into a laughing fit at his desk. “He’s being faced with the demons of his past,” he explains to Clint. “When he used to be a one-man army against the hooligans of Brooklyn.”

It’s Clint’s turn to stare.

“That is _such_ an exaggeration,” Rogers says. But he doesn’t deny it, Clint notes.

“Wait, I wanna hear this,” Wilson says.

“It didn’t last very long,” Rogers says with a shrug. “Got beat up one too many times. Decided to make a real difference instead. Ended up here.”

“That’s the boring version,” Barnes says. “I’ve got the pictures to prove it.”

Apparently this is the breaking point for Stark, who has been sulking at his desk and pretending not to listen. “It’s a crime for you to not share those,” he says. “You know what—I’ll _pay_ you.”

“Nah,” Barnes says. “The blackmail value’s too good to pass up.”

“You’re not invited to dinner tonight,” Rogers tells him.

“Guess I’ll starve,” Barnes says.

Neither of them sound very fazed.

“This is the shit I have to put up with,” Wilson says to no one in particular.

Odinson pats him on the back. “The days of my youth were wild as well,” he says. “It took me a long time to grow up.” His tone is not so much nostalgic or fond but genuinely thoughtful. Everyone else exchanges a look, and collectively decides to change the subject.

“Thank god it’s almost Friday,” Clint comes up with.

He’s on his way out when he realizes Romanoff is, too. She matches him stride for stride.

“Heard you invited Rumlow to Rogers’ party tomorrow night,” she says.

“It’s real generous of Stark to supply the drinks,” Clint says with a shrug. “Thought I’d spread the goodwill.”

“Huh,” she says. “I didn’t know you and Rumlow were close.”

 _We’re not,_ Clint almost says, but he catches himself. “We’re partners,” he says instead.

He doesn’t have to look at her to know she’s watching him. It seems, after all, that she always is. “Partners, then,” she says, and then they’re out of the station and onto the street. Clint blinks at rush hour traffic and the stream of sunlight between the buildings.

“I’ll see you tomorrow, Detective,” Clint says, turning back to her. She’s strapping her motorcycle helmet onto her head, swallowing up that tangle of red hair.

“You will,” Romanoff says, and she snaps the visor shut.

Clint watches her go in a cloud of steam exhaust. Stays there long after she’s gone.

 

_8:04 PM_

When he gets home it’s with a pizza box in his hand.

“My treat,” Clint tells the dog.

The dog runs excited circles around him in response.

Later that night, when the only light comes from the moon reflecting off the TV screen, Clint sits before the package of paper on the table. It’s too dark to read, but he knows what it says. Beside it, he carefully lays out his gun. He stares at them until they’re nothing more than indistinct shapes in the darkness.

He falls asleep like that, watching them, as though waiting for a move.

 


	5. Friday

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He turns off his alarm. Reads the text: _Watching Stark try not to lose his shit these days is better entertainment than the movies._ Takes the warning for what it is.

_7:30 AM_

He wakes up on the floor, because he’s nothing if not consistent. He turns off his alarm. Reads the text: _Watching Stark try not to lose his shit these days is better entertainment than the movies._ Takes the warning for what it is.

 _TGIF_ he replies, because surely he can’t be blamed for being a terrible conversationalist this early in the morning.

There’d been a dream, but he doesn’t have to remember it to know what it had been. When he gets up he stretches out every limb in his body. Legs, arms, the roll of his neck. Not out of any particular care, but with a mild interest. Something not far from wonder.

“Huh,” Clint says, and claps his hands together just to hear the echo.

He spends longer than he’d like to admit ruffling the dog’s fur. The dog snuffles in his sleep, appeased. Clint leaves the leftover pizza box out on the table, lid opened for easy access. Fingers the space on the dog’s neck where a collar should be.

Tonight, Clint decides. He’ll come up with a name tonight. When he comes home.

The package of paper and his gun are right where he’d left them.

He picks up the gun on his way out.

The sky outside is clear.

 

_8:10 AM_

Banner’s on the train. Clint allows himself a moment of surprise.

Then he walks over.

“Hey, Detective,” Clint says.

“Officer,” Banner says.

It’s been a while since Clint’s done this. _So did you sell your car in a decision to become an environmentalist,_ or _did you see that rat fighting a pigeon in the middle of the station,_ or maybe even _how are you doing?_

“You’ve got a coffee stain on your tie,” Clint says.

They both take a moment to consider the splotch of crusted black.

“Huh,” Banner says, after a while. His smile rueful. “You know what’s funny?”

Clint scratches at the back of his head. “What?”

“I don’t care,” Banner says, like a revelation. He loosens his tie, unravels it from his collar. Slips it into his jacket pocket.

Clint stares at him. Banner’s hair is greying, the bags under his eyes pronounced. He looks old, tired, and immensely pleased with himself.

Clint can’t help himself. He throws his head back and laughs.

Banner startles, then. Watches him from behind his glasses, like it’s the first time he’s seeing him.

Then he starts to laugh, too, with a slow shake of his head.

The train moving forward beneath their feet.

 

_8:38 AM_

Stark is conspicuously more collected about Banner’s absence this morning. Clint needn’t have worried.

“He arrives,” is all he says as they sweep in through the doors, if rather stiffly. He doesn’t even look up from his monitor.

Banner says nothing.

Lewis looks like she’s watching a soap opera. Clint steps on her foot on his way to the locker room.

When he gets back everyone is clustered around Odinson’s desk for some reason. There’s a video playing on his monitor. Security footage from last night of Odinson taking down a group of men practically single-handed.

“They were robbing the bank,” Odinson explains. “I just happened to be in the bank at the time.”

“Unlucky for them,” comments Romanoff.

On screen one of the hooded figures points a gun at Odinson. Odinson swats the gun out of his grip like a troublesome fly, picks it up, and uses it to knock the guy out.

“Ouch,” says Barnes. He sounds almost impressed.

Wilson whistles, low. “Remind me to never get on your bad side.”

Stark looks like he’s remembering a certain photocopy machine, if all the blood leaving his face is any indication.

“This was nothing,” Odinson says, dismissive. “You should have seen me in my early years.”

Clint has a sudden vision of Odinson as a boy, band-aid on his nose, wild-haired and freckled, terrorizing all the other kids in his neighbourhood. Then he thinks of Kate, and the fistful of teens following in her wake, and he wishes he hadn’t.

“It’s a good thing you were there,” Rogers says, and Clint remembers something else.

“Oh, hey, Detective,” Clint says. “Congratulations.”

Rogers blinks at him. “What for?”

Clint gestures vaguely. “You know,” he says. “Five years.”

Rogers is still blinking at him.

What was it Odinson had said. _A magnificent surprise._ “Ah,” Clint says. “Never mind.”

He’s saved by a whirlwind of neatly pressed uniform and clipboard. “Briefing room,” Fury barks, and then, without even pausing, “no tie, Banner?”

Stark’s head snaps up to look at Banner for the first time that morning.

“I forgot it at home,” Banner says, in the same manner he tells the reporters _No comment_ after a particularly gruesome case.

“Huh,” Fury says. He looks like he wants to say something more, but he must catch the look of dangerously growing delight in Stark’s eyes and sweeps past them instead. “Detectives and officers,” he says. “Let’s get on with it, shall we?”

 

_11:22 AM_

Rumlow is in his element today. Nothing and no one escapes him—not the burglar making a hasty getaway, not the hit-and-run motorcyclist, not the two men assaulting another on the street. He looks smoother than Clint’s ever seen him, cool and collected behind his sunglasses, but there’s a feral air to his smile, a hint of teeth.

“I love this fuckin’ job,” Rumlow says in the driver’s seat.

Clint idly inspects the seam of his sleeve, where the thread is starting to unravel. Says nothing.

 

_2:30 PM_

As they drive down the streets Clint can’t keep himself from watching out the windows. Scanning the crowds.

“You looking for someone?” Rumlow says eventually.

“Nah,” Clint says. “Just looking.”

He stops after that.

 

_5:11 PM_

In the middle of a bodega hold-up Rumlow shouts “Stand down,” and Clint sees the exact moment the robber isn’t gonna. Eyes darting wildly back and forth from the gun in Rumlow’s hands to the exit Clint’s blocking. Don’t do it, Clint thinks, but the guy is already diving for Rumlow’s legs, tackling him to the ground. The gun goes flying.

Clint catches it, but there’s no need. Rumlow’s got the guy pinned to the floor, handcuffs ready. The bodega owner is filming everything on her phone.

“Fuck him up,” she yells. She must be pushing fifty. There are two rings in her nose and one in her lip.

“Ma’am,” Clint says. “Please.”

The cat laid out on the counter yawns at him.

Later, on their way back to the station, Clint nudges Rumlow from the passenger seat.

“Your gun,” he says, handing it to him.

They’re stopped at a red light. Rumlow shoves the gun into his holster without looking.

“Man,” he says. “That guy was a dumbass.”

“A real piece of work,” Clint agrees.

The light turns green, and they go.

 

_6:53 PM_

“Hey, Clint,” says Lewis when he emerges from the locker room. “You heading to Rogers’ party?”

“Yep,” Clint says. He spares a glance at the near-empty station. “Looks like we’re going to be late. Everyone else is already there.”

“Looks like,” Lewis says. She’s sitting on top of her desk, scrolling through her phone. “Hey, listen. Have you ever dyed your hair?”

“What?”

“Gonna take that as a no,” Lewis says. She’s looking at him now instead of her phone, which is slightly alarming. “I think you could rock being a redhead. Don’t you?”

Clint gapes at her. “Are you... are you actually expecting a response?”

“Kinda,” Lewis says. “You know your Facebook profile doesn’t have any pictures of you after 2013?”

“I don’t have a Facebook,” Clint says. Is he having a stroke?

Lewis squints at her screen. “Oh. Damn. Should’ve known even you wouldn’t have attempted a mullet. There goes the blackmail gold.” A pause. “Also, that explains why you never accepted my friend request. Aren’t you on anything at all? Instagram? LinkedIn? Tinder?”

“I have an email,” Clint says.

“Good for you,” Lewis says. Her phone chirps, and she glances down at her screen. “Oh, thank god. Come on, let’s go, before we end up looking like assholes instead of just fashionably late.”

She practically steers him out of the station and toward the bar. Clint, for the most part, lets himself be steered. He’s still stuck on _redhead._

“Okay, hotshot, look alive,” Lewis says, none of which makes any sense at all, and then she pushes him through the doors.

Inside, every face turns to him, and he remembers—two weeks ago, ice sinking into the skin of his forehead, dripping down his face, every eye sizing him up, Fury watching him from over the desk of his office, a ringing in his ears—

“Happy birthday,” a chorus of voices calls out, and Clint blinks just in time for Lewis to snap a picture on her phone.

“This one’s going on Facebook,” she informs him. “Make one so I can tag you in it, won’t you?”

“Lewis,” Clint says, “were you _stalling_ me.”

“Excuse me,” Lewis says, “my name is _Darcy_ ,” and then, with a shrug, “it worked, didn’t it?”

Everyone is there. Rogers and Barnes and Wilson toasting him, Romanoff and Odinson at the bar, Banner hovering in the back with a glass of water in his hands, Stark trying to convince the bartender to play _Dancing Queen_ on the speakers. Even Fury, Coulson, and Hill, though they only spare him a nod before returning to a hushed conversation at one of the tables. There are a few other officers Clint’s worked with, and Rumlow, knocking back a shot at the bar. Now Clint realizes how stupid it must have looked, inviting Rumlow to his own surprise birthday party. Romanoff doesn’t say anything, but her shrug perfectly conveys _I told you so._

How did you know, Clint doesn’t ask, because it’s a stupid question. Instead, to Odinson: “I can’t believe you lied to me.”

Odinson beams at him. “I did say it would be a magnificent surprise,” he says, raising his massive mug of beer at him.

“And Lewis,” Clint says. “ _Darcy._ Whose idea was that?”

“You would’ve been suspicious of anyone else,” Romanoff says, matter-of-fact. “She has a talent for distraction, doesn’t she?”

“That’s one term for it, sure,” Clint says. “Another could be ‘inflicting trauma.’”

“Please,” Lewis says. “I didn’t even pull out the big guns yet.”

There’s another question in the air. Clint feels it burn in his throat. He lets it die there. Signals the bartender instead.

“So how old are you anyway,” Lewis pipes up, and Clint raises his glass at her, smiles innocently.

“Why don’t you bet on it,” he says, and drinks.

 

_8:12 PM_

“You know,” Stark says almost conversationally. “I never did figure out how you figured out where the hostages were. Two weeks ago.”

Clint is picking at the last of his fries. “The vents,” he says, flicking salted grease from under his fingernail.

“Yeah, I know that, now,” Stark says. An air of impatience. “I said—how you figured it out.”

When I didn’t. The implication is clear. Perhaps clearer than he would have liked, but the man is drunk and on his way to drunker still.

“Everyone else was more focused on the bomb threat at the time,” Clint says, and then, politely: “Haven’t you had enough?”

“Aww, that’s cute,” Stark says. “I’m a high-functioning alcoholic, don’t worry.” He cups his hands to his mouth. “Another round on me,” he shouts, and the bar erupts in whoops and cheers. He drops his hands. “Anyway. You were saying?”

“I wasn’t,” Clint says.

Stark leans forward on the table. Peers at him. “C’mon,” he says. “You can tell me. What’s that saying? Two can keep a secret.”

“The saying doesn’t end there,” Clint says.

“Oh, whatever,” Stark says. Is he sulking? He’s sulking. Also drunk. “I don’t care, anyway. I just thought it was—” He pauses. “Interesting.”

Just what Clint wants—to be found _interesting_ by Tony Stark. But there’s truth to the statement, he can tell, if coaxed out by the alcohol. A genuine curiosity in Stark’s voice. The way he regards Clint even now.

“Body language,” Clint tells him. “He was looking at us, but his body was practically pointed to the vent. He gave himself away.”

Stark squints at him. “That’s it? That’s the big secret?”

“That’s all there is,” Clint says. Stark looks faintly disappointed.

“Who would’ve even thought those vents would’ve fit people in there,” Stark mutters.  

Clint says nothing.

“Well,” Stark says. He tilts his glass in Clint’s direction. Alcohol splashes over the rim and wets his fingers, but he doesn’t seem to notice, or more likely, to care. “It’s been enlightening. Y’know I have fifty bucks riding on you being secretly FBI?”

Clint snorts before he can stop himself. See, he thinks. The body gives everything away.

“Join the party, already, will you,” Stark says, jabbing his finger at him. “Fury’s going mad. Taking out the waste of your competence on us. Why wouldn’t you accept, anyway?”

Clint shrugs. “I don’t know,” he says. “Why don’t you go talk to Banner, already?”

Stark goes still. Just a moment. Then he’s all movement again, sway and stumble and grinning leer, but just the moment was enough. “Who, Bruce?” he says. “Why would I have anything to say to him, aside from the usual mockery of his fashion sense?”

Body language, Clint could say. You’re looking at me, but your body’s practically pointed to the man standing at the back of the bar. You gave yourself away.

Instead, Clint says, “Ever considered that he might have something to say to you?”

Stark looks at him. There it is. Curiosity. “Huh,” he says, and then, “I’m upping the ante. A hundred bucks, easy.”

Clint snorts, again. “Go on,” he says.

Stark goes. But he sets down his glass, first. Small surprises.

At the bar, Rogers is watching the crowd with a strange intensity, where Wilson and Barnes are doing something suspiciously like dancing. He startles when Clint comes up to join him.

“Oh, Clint,” Rogers says. “You snuck up on me.”

Clint takes a moment to consider it.

“Seems I’ve been doing that to people a lot,” he says.

Rogers turns to look at him. Quirks an eyebrow. “So are you going to stay?”

It’s so awfully direct that Clint is stuck for a moment thinking of the package of paper he’d left in his apartment room. Then, in the corner of his eye, Rumlow slips away from the table he’s been occupying for the last thirty minutes and out the back, and Clint drags himself back down to earth.

“Excuse me,” Clint says.

He leaves as surreptitiously as possible.

 

_9:30 PM_

The docks are nearly deserted at this time. In the far distance, a ship horn sounds. Clint finds himself behind a stack of crates, listening intently to smatterings of a conversation, hushed and terse. Waiting for his opening.

“Okay, that’s it,” comes a voice from somewhere behind him. “I’m going to file a restraining order on your ass.”

Clint freezes. Already knows what he’s going to see before he even turns around: crossed arms, unimpressed gaze, a bruised eye yellowing in the darkness. Thinks, very clearly: _fuck._

Another night flashes before his eyes: a purple dress, tear-streaked face. _Don’t take me back there. Please._

“Kate,” Clint says, voice low, deliberate. “Get the hell out of here.”

“What was that,” Rumlow says, head whipping around to stare in their direction, and Clint vaults over the crates and walks into the fray. Hands held up before him.

“Hey, partner,” he says.

Rumlow stares at him for a long moment. Clint takes the time to watch the crystallization of understanding in his eyes: from shock to disbelief to anger. Twisting his face into something unrecognizable, but not unfamiliar. What’s always been lurking beneath the surface.

“Barton,” Rumlow snarls. “What the _fuck_ are you doing here?”

“It’s over, Rumlow,” Clint says, palms still in the air. “The entire precinct is converging on our location right now. You’re done.”

“What the fuck is this,” the rest of them are shouting. Two of their guns are aimed at Rumlow, the other at Clint. But Clint’s only got eyes for one: the barrel pointed between his eyes, raised in Rumlow’s clenched fist.

“You’re bluffing,” Rumlow says. “They’re all at your goddamn birthday party.”

Clint raises an eyebrow. “Why would they stay there without the person whose birthday they’re supposed to be celebrating?”

Rumlow’s eyes dart around the dock. “Then why aren’t they coming out?”

“They’ll be here any minute,” Clint says, “just put your gun down, Rumlow, it’s over.”

He says it without an ounce of conviction. Clint’s spent eight months working by this man’s side; he knows him better than that. Rumlow does too, if the ugly curl of his mouth is any indication.

“You little shit,” Rumlow says, and then three things happen, all at once.

Rumlow pulls the trigger.

The gun clicks.

A purple Converse shoe comes sailing out of the darkness and hits Rumlow in the head.

After that, things take on a considerable speed. Clint lunges for Rumlow, slamming them both down to the ground and rolling them behind cover. The others panic and let loose a spray of gunfire. In the distance, a burst of sirens.

“Kate, stay _down,_ ” Clint yells in her direction, and then the heel of Rumlow’s hand is coming up to crush his nose. His vision whites out for a moment at the sickening crack of cartilage, but there’s no time to catch his breath. They’re grappling with each other on the ground, Clint half-blinded, Rumlow struggling beneath him. He can hear confusion in the background, more gunshots. “Kate?” he means to shout, but it comes out as a grunt as Rumlow knees him particularly viciously in the gut. It winds him for a second too long, and hands are wrapping around his neck and pressing down.

Cracked fingernails, Clint thinks. Tinged with blue.

His eyes are rolling back in his head when the pressure lifts from his throat. A flash of red. A crack of bone, a pained yelp.

“Happy birthday,” Romanoff says.

Funny. She doesn’t look pleased at all.

“Kate,” Clint wheezes through his teeth.

“She’s fine,” Romanoff says. “Took down one of them by herself. More than I can say for you.”

The lights streaking red and white across everything. He closes his eyes, feels the ground against his back. A whisper of grass in his mind.

“Clint,” Romanoff says, and her voice is clearer, closer now. “Get up.”

He opens his eyes. Gets up.

 

_10:58 PM_

“So,” Fury says.

Clint watches the steeple of Fury’s fingers on his desk. Stays silent.

“Let me get this straight,” Fury says. “You had suspicions that your partner was involved with the biggest drug ring in the city.”

“Yes, sir,” Clint says.

“You discovered information that he was going to be transporting a shipment of Blue Ice tonight.”

“Yes, sir.”

“You then proceeded to give him an alibi so that you could track his movements and bring him down alone and without backup, because you decided not to disclose any of this to anyone, despite the fact that you are a _motherfucking police officer._ ”

Clint swallows. “Yes, sir.”

“Shut up. Don’t _yes, sir_ me.”

“Yes, s—yes. Okay.”

“I said shut up,” Fury barks. Clint shuts up.

There is a long pause. Clint watches Fury watch him, and hopes that isn’t a strangling motion he’s making with his hands.

“Your plan,” Fury says, eerily calm. It isn’t what Clint was expecting him to say. “Follow Rumlow, catch him in the act, take down him and all the others with him. I have a question, Officer.”

Ah. “Yes?”

“Are you an _idiot,_ ” Fury says. “Do you have anything in that thick skull of yours? Did you want to die?”

“Sir,” Clint says. “I had to be sure. I had to be sure of him.”

It’s only a half-truth. He’s sure Fury can tell, because the strangling motions intensify.

“What a coincidence that Rumlow just forgot to load his gun,” Fury says.

Clint shrugs. “Lucky.”

“Bullshit,” Fury says. His tone is more than angry, Clint realizes—it’s cold. “You staked your life—and others’—on sheer dumb luck.”

His voice is a wire of tension pulled taut. Clint could snap it like a string, let him live up to his last name.

Or he could do something else.

“On routine,” Clint says. “I’ve been working at Rumlow’s side for the past eight months. I know everything he does and everything he doesn’t do. Like check his gun at the end of a shift.”

He reaches in his pocket. Scatters the handful of bullets onto the desk.

Another pause.

“Jesus goddamn Christ,” Fury says. “This is the most harebrained fucking thing I have ever seen _anyone_ do. What about the others? What were you going to do about them? Melt the bullets in their guns with laser vision?”

“Rumlow’s the one in charge,” Clint says. “It was him I was worried about. And anyway—the detectives. They were going to notice I was gone from the bar soon enough.”

“Of course,” Fury says. “And they would know exactly where you would be bleeding out. Is that right?”

Clint looks away from Fury’s hands to his own. “Rumlow’s my partner,” he says. “I was the only one responsible for him.” It's the most honest thing he's said all night.

“I’m going to kill you myself,” Fury tells him.

One more pause.

“Barton,” Fury says. “I called you into this office on Monday. I thought I saw something in you. Recklessness, sure. That’s nothing new. Stupidity, well, that can’t be helped. But two weeks ago you figured out where those hostages were when everyone else was panicking at the bomb threat—you did it before _Stark._ Thought I saw in you a good detective. Think now that I thought wrong.”

Clint stares at his own fingernails. Cracked. There’s gravel in his palms.

“I asked you a question,” Fury says. “Why you’re doing this in the first place. Is it to solve flashy crimes, show off your skills? Make a fool of your team? Play the hero?”

Clint thinks about it. Finds himself stuck on Kate Bishop, her face looming in the darkness.

“No,” he says. “To save people.”

Fury’s face is impassive. “Is that still what you want?”

Clint holds himself still. A stillness so absolute he can become it, he remembers. Be swallowed up inside.

“Yes,” he says, and breaks it.

“Then you’d better fucking act like it,” Fury says. “Because if my memory serves me correctly, it was your ass getting saved tonight.”

Clint winces.

“Here’s what we’re going to do,” Fury says. “I’m going to suspend you for two weeks. You’re going to get your head out of your ass. Then you can return to your duty as a police officer. Or you can accept my recommendation and become a part of the investigative team, where people have each other’s backs and actually keep each other from getting killed. Is that clear?”

“Crystal,” Clint says.

“Good,” Fury says. “Now get your sorry ass home before I regret letting you off easy.”

Clint scrambles for the door.

“Oh, and Barton,” Fury says.

Clint stops. “Yes?”

“Happy fucking birthday.”

“Thank you, sir.”

“Get the hell out.”

“Yes, sir.”

 

_11:13 PM_

Kate Bishop is sitting on the bench outside the station. Romanoff is seated next to her. Clint stops in his tracks to fully take in the surreality of the situation.

“You,” Kate says.

“Me,” Clint says.

Romanoff nods her head at him coolly. Stands and steps back into the shadows, as though to afford them some privacy. But she doesn’t leave.

“So, like,” Kate says after a while. “What the fuck was that?”

“A mess,” Clint says. He’s suddenly tired. Everything aches. His bandaged nose, his ribs, the swallow of his throat. “What were you even doing there?”

“I had my own business,” Kate says.

Clint looks at her.

“Fine,” Kate says. “I like the docks. I go there sometimes to clear my head. So sue me.”

“It’s not safe,” Clint says.

“Nowhere is,” Kate says sharply.

Clint remembers a cold night in Central Park. He hadn’t even been on duty, or anything. Just couldn’t sleep. Then—a girl in a torn dress, purple silk bunched up in her fists, hair a mess.

“Ma’am,” he had said. “I’m a cop, with the NYPD. You’re safe now.”

“No, I’m not,” she said, and burst into tears.

Kate stares at him now. Eyes dry and focused. One shoe still untied.

“I totally saved your life,” she says.

“The gun was empty,” Clint says.

“I’m right and you know it.”

“You’re right,” Clint agrees. “You saved me. We’re even, now.”

Kate stiffens. “You really believe it, don’t you,” she says, slowly. “You dummy.”

Clint closes his eyes. “Believe what?”

“That it’s because you saved me,” she says. Her voice suddenly running cold. Like Fury’s, back in his office. “That I owe you a debt.”

“You don’t,” Clint says. “You never did.”

“It wasn’t that you saved me,” Kate says. “It’s that you took me back home afterward.”

“I know,” Clint says. He’s so tired. “I know.”

“God, you saved me, you were my fucking _hero,_ and then you brought me back there.” Her voice trembles. “How could you? How could you do that to me?”

I didn’t know, Clint could say, but it wouldn’t be the truth. He could have guessed. He could have listened. He should have known. “You were in shock. You needed to be somewhere stable. I thought it was for the best.”

“Yeah, well,” Kate says. “You were wrong. This black eye didn’t come from the streets, you know.”

Her voice is brittle, cruel. Meant to hurt. Clint knows it, and feels it just the same. Fist clenching at his side. Then letting go.

“I’m sorry,” he says.

Kate stares at him. Everything about her stiff-backed position held so delicately together. Then she deflates all at once.

“Whatever,” she says. “I shouldn’t have expected—you’re just a cop. You didn’t know. You couldn’t have known.”

A face Clint hasn’t imagined in years, standing over him. An open-handed slap to the cheek. Knuckles under his jaw, finding their way to the soft unprotected skin of his neck. Toe of a boot digging deep between his ribs, nudging at the curl of his body. Come on, get up. Get up, boy. Get up.

“I’m sorry,” he says again.

“I said whatever,” Kate says. “I can take care of myself, really.”

Headlights in the distance, cutting their way. Clint squints at it. A familiar car.

“Oh,” he says, stricken. “Your father—”

“The station had to alert my parents,” Kate says with a shrug. “Since I’m a witness to an investigation now and all.”

“But—”

“I can take care of myself,” Kate repeats. “It’s not like I didn’t know what I was getting myself into.”

“I told you to run,” Clint says helplessly.

“Yeah, well,” she says. “I’ve had enough of running. Been thinking of taking up fighting instead.”

The car draws nearer.

“Are you really running a teenage vigilante gang,” Clint asks.

Kate just shakes her head at him pityingly.

“Bye, Officer,” she says. “I’ll see you around.”

“Or not?” Clint says hopefully.

“Nah,” Kate says. “Think I will.”

She waves at him, and then at Romanoff, who’s still lurking in the shadows. Turns and walks to the car waiting for her by the side of the road. One shoe still untied.

“She’s a strong girl,” Romanoff says.

The car peels away in a cloud of exhaust.

“She’s had to be,” Clint says. A touch of defeat in his voice.

“She saved your life,” Romanoff says.

“She didn’t have to,” Clint says.

“So did I,” Romanoff says. “And I shouldn’t have had to.”

Clint turns to face her for the first time. Her head is cocked, eyes blank. Like she’s listening, in tune to some frequency he can’t reach.

“You must have known,” Clint says. “You asked me about Rumlow—you followed me from the bar. You must have known all along.”

“I knew that you were up to something,” Romanoff says. Her voice is neutral. “How lucky for you that I felt the need to follow up on it.”

“It’s what you _do,_ ” Clint says. For some reason he’d rather not examine, frustration is building in his chest. “You found me out. My phone number, my birthday. I would have thought you would have figured this out too. I thought that you, of all people—”

“Would understand?” Romanoff’s eyes glitter in the dark. “I suppose it was silly of me to assume that my attempts to reach out would be received with reciprocation, rather than the need to pry deeper—”

“Reach out?” Clint repeats. “You weren’t _reaching out,_ you were trying to _infiltrate_ —you were trying to _know_ me—”

“And if I had asked?” Romanoff says.

Clint falls silent.

“Like everyone else?” Romanoff’s gaze holds him steady. “Like everyone else has been, for the past two years?”

The night is deepening over the city. Cars pass them by, traffic lights blinking through their colours. Red, green, yellow.

“Would I have known you then?” Romanoff doesn’t relent. “Do they?”

Clint lets out a breath he can’t see, only feels.

“I didn’t think I wanted this,” he says.

“And yet here you are,” Romanoff says.

The tension has bled away into the stifling summer air. They’ve reached an impasse. An understanding of sorts. No way forward but through.

“It really was a stupid plan,” Clint admits after a while.

Romanoff huffs out something that might be a breath or a laugh. “Glad you’re finally on the same page as the rest of us.”

“I’m on a two-week suspension,” Clint says.

Romanoff hums noncommittally. “And then?”

“And then...” Clint hesitates. “And then I stay, I suppose.”

“Hmm,” Romanoff says. She’s back to neutral, so smoothly Clint has to wonder if her expression had ever changed in the first place. “It’s your decision.”

“You don’t have to sound so unenthusiastic about it,” Clint tells her.

Romanoff raises an eyebrow at him. “Is that what I am?”

“You know what,” Clint says. “I’m going home.”

“That’s probably a good idea,” Romanoff agrees. “You look like shit.”

She starts to put on her motorcycle helmet.

“Hey,” Clint says. “Can you give me a ride? I bet you already know where I live.”

Romanoff gets on her bike. “You don’t live on the way,” she says, and flips the visor closed.

Figures.

She shoots him a two-fingered wave before she speeds off, though.

Clint returns it to her back disappearing into the night.

 

_1:02 AM_

He opens the door and is met with a faceful of fur. He has to stagger to keep from being bowled over backward, arms flailing up to grab the dog and set him safely back down on the floor.

“Down, boy,” Clint says.

The pizza box is empty. He should’ve picked up some food on his way home. The dog, though, seems content to just swirl around his ankles, tongue lolling out.  

“Good boy,” Clint says, scratching behind the dog’s ears. He pauses, lets out a laugh. “Lucky.”

The dog wags his tail.

It’s a rare moment of silence. No noise from the neighbours or the street. Only the sinking air of a summer night, settling in. Ready to be overturned in the morning.

On the table, the packet of papers sits neatly where he’d left it. Clint picks it up and drops down onto the couch. Flips to the first page.

He starts reading.

 

**END OF PART ONE**

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i didn't originally plan on it being clint's birthday, but [what a surprise](http://mattfraction.com/post/47404164842/dear-mr-fraction-hawkeye-is-basically-the-best) to find it roll right around this time. 
> 
> (to those who are reading, and to those who have left lovely comments—thank you. this has been truly the most fun, indulgent shit i must have always secretly wanted to write. we've got two parts, two weeks, the space of one year left to go.)


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